A Dance with the Stranger
by PhoenixFlame6
Summary: Everyone dances with the Stranger, but no one danced quite like Cersei Lannister.
1. An Old Song

**A Dance with the Stranger**

**Chapter One / An Old Song**

**Author's Note:** Originally written for ASOIAF Kink Meme**. **Based on the musical _Elisabeth_, where the Empress Sisi has a love-hate relationship with Death. While there are dialogue references and section headers based on the musical, you **do not** need any familiarity with _Elisabeth_ to follow the story. Enjoy! Reviews greatly appreciated.

* * *

_"No one was as proud as her._  
_She despised you._  
_She laughed at you. _  
_No one ever understood her._

_Spoiled! Threatened!_  
_We were scared of what she desired._  
_A shadow laid on her soul,_  
_A curse laid on her life._

- _Elisabeth_

* * *

_… Prolog …_

* * *

Cersei Lannister's heart would be heavy, were she not leaving to marry Rhaegar Targaryen. Her father prepares for King's Landing and will bring her along as his charming, beguiling daughter. In two or three years, she will wed her dragon prince and be the happiest girl in the world. Her father promised.

Jaime has scarce left her side, knowing she leaves to become a princess and he stays to become a knight. To be a princess—and later a queen—has a price. But Cersei will pay it.

The feast buzzes around her, words too jumbled to hear. They have a grand hall but the summer breeze has made the day so beautiful that her lord father erected giant pavilions outside the castle. She looks down the table to Tywin but he is speaking with Aunt Genna. _Good._ That means she can go find Jaime, who had disappeared after the swan was served. Graciously excusing herself, she makes for the courtyard.

Instead of her twin, several lordling sons tramp around.

"My lady," greets the taller one. "Help us find your brother."

Cersei eyes the young man who is trying, and failing, to grow a beard. Of _course_ Jaime still plays hiding games. He forgets he is not a child anymore. But Cersei knows where he must be. The courtyard hosts a lion statue three times as tall as her father, brought from the Free Cities,. It sits on its haunches, claws jutting from its paws, guarding Casterly Rock. Dragonstone has its crumbling stone gargoyles. She has a giant lion.

"You're behind its mane, Jaime!"

At her voice a blond flash of curl wisps out from behind the lion's neck, but quickly pulls back. He always hides up there, tucked in the hollow between its pale shoulders, free to laugh at all the people who are too scared to look.

But Cersei is not afraid. While Jaime would eventually come out if she asked enough, she is reckless after several cups of wine and restless after hours at a dull feast. She kicks off her slippers and steps onto the lion's paw.

"My lady, you can't climb it."

Cersei turns to smirk at the lordling. "A lioness has claws, and mine are sharp enough."

_Cowardly boy, to be afraid of a statue._ She has climbed it before, albeit with Jaime there to guide and pull.

Yanking her dress to her knees, she wedges her foot in another hollow, then another, and then her hands find their own spaces. Finally, a blond head pokes out above her. Jaime looks down and laughs. The afternoon sun catches his hair just right. No dragon has hoarded such fine gold._Until Rhaegar marries you, of course._ Cersei grins. She is no limpid southron lady, nor a wild she-beast of the North. She is a lioness, proud and elegant and fierce. And she wants to look down on Casterly Rock one last time with her brother.

"Sister, fine, I'll come down." He edges around the lion's mane, feet effortlessly finding the nooks in its muscular shoulders.

"Stay, I want to come up."

She climbs higher, fingers and toes starting to ache but paying no mind. She is almost halfway.

"My lady, get down at once!"

_Wrinkled crone._ Cersei is furious the crotchety septa will accompany them to King's Landing. Paying her no mind, she pulls herself up. _How could Father punish me anyway? _Her brother looks caught between amusement and unease. She grins, even as her feet scrape painfully against the rock. Like as not he imagines a kiss between those lion shoulders, a hiding place where they are safe to touch and kiss and play. At last he kneels and extends a hand. Cersei is too high to easily get back down. It will have to be with Jaime. The wind pulls more at her gown.

"_Cersei Lannister you will_—" but her father's glacial voice snaps off as Cersei's dress, so fine and delicate, catches underfoot.

She digs in her good foot and _heaves_, a lioness's desperate leap for the top. In truth, she has no claws. But her lunge does push her back from the statue, back and _down_. Jaime dives, swipes, trying to grab her wrist. _Too slow you fool!_ Cersei feels a screech in her throat as she plummets, straight to the stone-paved courtyard. It _hurts_. Breath wheezes and she swears her lungs have collapsed. Nothing compares to the crack of her head hitting stone, or the ringing in her ears that heralds only black.

_Rhaegar…_

* * *

_… Schwarzer Prinz / Black Prince …_

* * *

Her cheek rests against something soft. Incredibly soft—like a maiden's velvet, or a rabbit's downy fur. Cracking an eye open, she sighs in relief when there is no bright light. A chuckle rumbles above her. _Who carries me?_

She snaps up, ready to scream. But she only looks into two beautiful violet eyes. Her brow furrows. _Rhaegar Targaryen is carrying me?_ The crown prince looks down at her and offers a wry smile. She sees the glint of one incisor. Yet…she is at Casterly Rock, and Rhaegar lives in King's Landing. And his eyes are _wrong_. She fell in love with her dragon prince because of his melancholy gaze, gentle but never weak. The eyes looking down at her are sharp with humor. And something sharper.

_The fall._ Cersei writhes, trying to hook an arm about his shoulder and make him stop. _The Stranger?_ She was falling, smashing—_dying? No!_ She has a prince to marry.

"Put me down, I am Cersei Lannister!"

His grin grows wider and toothier, so different from Rhaegar's brief smiles, "Why should I care? I claimed a kiss from Aemon the Dragonknight and Queen Visyna. You are just a lion cub."

Anger, hot and freeing, sharpens her thoughts. She slipped, Jaime missed, her father shouted, and the stones _crunched_. His arms are hooked beneath her back and knees, like a hero in a song, but no one sings about the Stranger.

"I am no cub, and I said leave me!" Before she can think, she slaps him.

Her skin meets cool flesh, hard bone, but no sound snaps back. The Stranger's eyes still widen, amused, almost surprised. Cersei glares. Everything around them is dark and billowing, aphotic even. Like he carries her beneath a bottomless lake.

Then she feels a softness beneath her. He settles her on…_on my bed_, with cold fingers grazing her brow, pushing back a lock of hair. The Stranger sits beside her, all care for propriety gone.

Her thoughts make her giggle. Of course she dreams. She hurt herself so she dreams of death, she loves Rhaegar so she dreams of her silver prince. People who hit their heads think funny, and Cersei remembers stones and cracking and ringing.

"Why should I?" he repeats, soft, sonorous, like an unchecked tide.

If this is a dream, her father cannot chastise her for being rude. Cersei looks him straight in the eye. "Because I am Cersei of House Lannister, soon to also be Cersei of House Targaryen, and you will not stop me."

The Stranger chuckles again, something she feels more than hears. He wears black, his doublet studded in dark rubies. _Velvet or leather?_ The texture seems to change every moment. He is a courtier, then he is a hunter…but he is _not_ Rhaegar. Though his silver hair frames his high cheekbones and his lilac eyes gleam in the scattered light, he is no dragon. _Or human_, she thinks. But he is _beautiful_. When has she thought the Stranger beautiful? Her septa makes her think of an old hooded man, cold like her father, cruel as a death in childbed. But her bed is so soft. It pulls her down, cradling every bit of her. It would be lovely to close her eyes…_no, don't sleep!_

Something steels in his eyes and he leans down—Cersei has not spent so long with Jaime as to not realize, and her hand covers his mouth.

"I am no tavern wench," she says, lowering her voice like her father, who almost never yells, but still scares every man at court.

The Stranger pulls back and she sees something soften.

"No you are not." He takes her hand and kisses it, his lips like ice. If they had touched her mouth, somehow she knows they would freeze all the breath in her body.

Still, some instinct makes her reach up and cup his cheek. The one she slapped, even if he deserved it. His other hand settles on hers and Cersei marvels at his long ivory fingers.

He is not Rhaegar, and certainly not Jaime. And yet, the _look _he gives her—as if his eyes have seen countless centuries and only now find something to intrigue them. Of all things, the _Stranger_ pays her court. To feel the curiosity of something so old and wise and untouchable…her throat tightens, her eyes sting. For this, she loves him a little. Before she knows what she is doing, she pushes herself up to kiss that cold and perfect mouth.

Instead, he pushes her back, gentle as the sweetest poison. Cersei saw the flash there, the hesitation, the fleeting surprise he refused her. And his desire, still a warm and unvarnished concept to her youthful mind. Could Jaime ever present a gift so grand?

"Not today," he says in whispery amusement.

Finally he stands, and Cersei marvels at his darkness, his pride, his beauty. His hair falls past his shoulders, a pale silver unnaturally of mortal earth since the Targaryens claimed Westeros. But to take his hand and demand he bring her along would mean an end, and Cersei's song has not even begun. So she stays, giving him a calm nod, puzzling if this is a silly fever dream or…something else. She dreams, and this gives her a rush of poised daring. Why can she not be both wanton as a doxy and regal as the queen she will one day be?

"We are alike, Stranger." She carries all the solemnity of a foolish girl who thinks she is in love. "Proud, oft alone because of it. You are a black prince, and I am a golden queen."

The amusement sharpens his eyes again, the dark pupils larger than the violent ring, making them more precious in turn. She knows, somehow, there will always be a detached cruelty there, no matter his regard. "Before you are a queen, you are mine."

Cersei scoffs at her obstinate dreams. She _is _a queen, first and forever. A dragon's golden queen. But his phantom disappears then, stepping back into the dark, departing her dreams. Cersei wishes…_no_, that is silly, for she is _dreaming_.

It seems a moment later she awakes in her bed. Someone lies alongside her, face buried in the hollow of her shoulder. She shoves Jaime off, wriggling until she can breathe without her stale breath rebounding off his skin. Immediately the stones grind into her skull and she whimpers, fighting back nausea. Her brow is slick with sweat, cheeks chilled from a broken fever.

Jaime stirs beside her, sleepy as a child one moment, alert as a hunter the next.

"Cersei…"

She looks at him, at his bright green eyes and golden waves, so like her own. Green, not violet.

"_What?_"

He rolls on top of her, his elbow propping him up so he does not lie with his full weight on her chest. His kiss says more than words, warm and sweet, caring but too ardent to be gentle. She considers pushing him away but she _tastes _his panic and grief.

_Foolish brother_, she thinks, for her tongue is otherwise occupied. _The Stranger pays me court. I would never die from something so inglorious as a cracked skull._

"I'm sorry," he chokes. "I let you fall."

She hears the guilt and kisses him more deeply. When she touches his warm cheek he flinches, making her draw back enough to see. The sputtering candle means she feels him more than sees him—sometimes she forgets which is which. But she knows his cheek bears a bruise, likely in the shape of a signet ring. _Shall I treat him to my powder?_

"Father?"

Jaime nods, his forehead against hers, breathing raw with worry and protective lust. Her brother has never taken her maidenhead, but she has had him in every other way.

Cersei leaves for King's Landing three days later, still prone to headaches but her father's sympathy is at an end. As far as he is concerned, her fall is her own fault. A lesson, not to reach so high.

* * *

_…Der letzte Tanz / The Final Dance…_

* * *

As Cersei sits at her wedding feast, a beauty of six-and-ten, her thoughts waver between joy and sorrow. Her dragon prince is dead, his chest smashed in by her new husband. Young King Robert could not save his lady love, a she-wolf who seduced Rhaegar Targaryen—Cersei refuses to believe her sweet prince would kidnap a woman and rape her. But Lyanna is dead, and Robert Baratheon has claimed a Lannister as a wife.

He bears not the beauty of her prince. Where Rhaegar was chiseled and melancholy, Robert is muscled and boisterous. A friend to all, some say._Unless you are a dragon_. Her thoughts pause when a callused hand extends to her.

"The first dance is mine, my queen." His wine-soaked breath makes her nose burn, but a dance is his right. _Many kinds of dances_.

Smiling is not so hard as she feared—he _is_ handsome and strong, with all the practical grace of a rutting stag. His eyes always match his mouth, and now they smile back at her. They dance to a gentle, spirited melody, his steps strong if not so deft, her own lithe feet easily keeping time. She is a queen, a stag's queen if not a dragon's. The only queen in all seven kingdoms. That is worth something.

She shivers as icicles prick her neck. She wears a Southron wedding dress, with elaborate cream skirts but a fitted, shoulder-bearing bodice. The shiver stays, vacillating between alluring and uncomfortable, like a hundred eyes on her exposed neck. Robert slows, his arm growing heavy at her hip, his feet sluggish. Even Jaime, standing near their hideous brother, wears a blank smile more sleepy than forcibly neutral. And the_ dark_—she feels it as much as sees it.

Robert's eyes stare at nothing and he stills, like a puppet frozen on its strings.

An icy hand grabs her wrist, spinning her around, and she looks into the face she thought only a dream. The Stranger.

Curse him, he still looks like her dragon prince. _Has he no respect for the dead?_ Cersei would snap at him, but his eyes chill her blood. They crackle with glacial fury. As if she is in the middle of a lake covered in paper-thin ice.

He smiles, canines sharp. "You wasted little time," he says, voice like slithering frost. Never like Rhaegar's.

His other hand drops to her waist and he draws her too close, so she must tilt her chin to meet his eyes. Behind him, the feast hall has gone still and silent.

Cersei still scoffs. As if her time was hers to waste. "Did _you _put a cloak on me?" she asks, not caring if she speaks with bravado.

"I merely wish a dance with the ephemeral bride. And to give my condolences."

Her ears sharpen around his last word. "Don't be a fool."

"Dance with me and I will prove otherwise." The threat is there. He pulled back from her lips once, but Cersei knows, with the certainty of an expecting mother who awakens to bloody sheets, he will not have a second moment of weakness. But she finds herself fixing him with her lioness's bloody smile, slipping into a dance that's tune only exists in her head.

Few dances have only one partner, even among ribald peasants. But her feet follow his, too long trained not to find his steps. Still, it is a strange dance, full of sweeps and turns—is he_ trying _to make her head spin? All she hears are their voices and sorrowing music. Her shoes make no sound over the stones.

She will always meet his eyes. "Why would a young queen as beautiful as I need condolences on my wedding day?"

The Stranger loses his smile. Years ago he softened, but death can never suffer tenderness for long, only cool mercy.

"You were told why, in part, my sweet murderess."

Ice lances down her spine. Cersei _never _thinks about that day, of cursed fortune tellers and drowned companions, but she remembers the words.

"Nonsense," she hisses. "Did you see me living past that day at the Rock?" Cersei jars to a halt, tearing herself from the Stranger's cold embrace. Perhaps she dares her luck, but she cares not. Wine and crowns have made her bold. "War and death may lead others. Not me." She is a lioness, she is led by _no one_.

He bows, all mocking grace—_did my bitch of a septa ever imagine this when she prayed_? "Enjoy your cage, dear lioness. You gave me a dance, brief though it was." Cersei smirks. What _wouldn't _be brief to him? But his face does not change from its wrathful grin and she finds herself stepping back. "The shadows grow longer. One day, we will dance again."

Cersei backs into her husband, blinks as she collects herself, and suddenly sound returns to the hall. Robert's hands squeeze her shoulders and he plants a wet kiss on her neck.

"We will have the bedding soon. Sooner, by the looks of it. You make a beautiful queen."

_But not a queen of love and beauty. _

_We will dance again._

She dares any maid to give a better wedding night than her. She and Jaime have made each other moan in a dozen different ways. Her maidenhead did not survive to her wedding night; Cersei vows to cut herself if need be, but at least the pain will be less. It is, barely. Seven save her if she had gone to his bed a maiden.

Her king chooses to reenact the Battle of the Trident, a damn sight drunker, and aiming his fury at her imagined maidenhood instead of Rhaegar's chest. Jaime, her beautiful Jaime, has made her scream and whimper, but for entirely different reasons. But she could bear that. Perhaps in time she could learn to like his beard scraping red marks over her chest and cheeks, his bulk making her gasp, and his thrusts hammering all the way to her lower back. What comes at the end, she cannot.

"_Lyanna_," he moans, his wine-raspy voice hot and wet against her ear.

"_Cersei!_" she snarls before she can stop herself. But he has already collapsed half upon her. Unlike Jaime, there is no protective love in his embrace. Only desire for a girl she knows for a thrice-damned_ fact_ he barely knew.

She curls away, scraped, sticky, and sore. Cersei knows his courtiers wait outside. She is half-tempted to throw open the door, teats unbound, and direct their gawking to her besotted husband. But instead she drifts off, wishing she were still in that feast hall where her feet made no sound.

Dawn is a mere suggestion when she wakes. Robert sleeps the sleep of sots. Shrugging on a dressing gown, she checks her face in the vanity mirror. Beautiful, as her mother birthed her, her father raised her, and her brother worshipped her. Her green eyes give away nothing of her own drinking. Cersei glances up, and startles from her fleeting thoughts. Violet and white-silver flash just out of sight. Her silly dreams, of course. Her king dreams of his dead she-wolf, his queen dreams of her broken dragon.

At least Jaime still lives.

She knows she is being reckless but she cares not. Her brother barely has the door open and his eyes rubbed free of sleep before she ducks under his arm, hissing at him to lock it. Jaime has not asked what would happen to them. The last time he did, he wound up in the Kingsguard and named the most dishonorable man in the realm. Yet he takes what she offers.

It is not long before Cersei knows now why the Stranger, however angry, still managed a spiteful smile at her wedding.

* * *

_…Stationen einer Ehe / Stations of Marriage…_

* * *

The stations of marriage soon become her world of quiet fury. Cersei imagined a queen as contributing to the rule of her king. Their first few years, she contributes to his bed when he wishes to feel dutiful and his arm when he holds a feast. Most days, Stannis frowns, Renly titters, and her father tells her to be grateful and beget an heir.

Cersei is_ not_ grateful when Robert insists she go with him to Dorne, despite Lannisters being less welcome there than modesty. Her father's men murdered the Prince's niece and nephew. Cersei would kill a dozen tasters. But he pesters, pushes, until finally she unsheathes her claws.

"Why not take the wolf-girl's bones? You two would make a far more _loving_—"

The backhand sends her reeling as numb heat cracks across her cheekbone. Her blood tastes sour and coppery. Robert stalks closer, less stag than ill-tempered sot.

"If you _ever _mention her again…" Robert trails off, the storm-blue eyes she once thought handsome narrowed in venom.

Jaime almost goes after him when his mouth smears her powder and her sighs turn to flinches. As a compromise, he begs her to take a personal guard—_not_ a Kingsguard—and suggests a minor noble's second son. She grimaces at his burned face when she first sees him, but when the towering man holds his own against Jaime in the practice yard, she appoints him her sworn shield. Only afterward does she realize he is the younger brother of Gregor Clegane, her father's fiercest dog.

Even with a brutal hound as her shadow, she has precious little to do but chatter with vapid women and remind her husband not everyone falls for his sledgehammer charm. Some days, she knows not if boredom or anger will kill her first.

Joffrey changes that. His birth is a battle, bloodier than Robert's same-day takedown of a poor doe in the kingswood. Even Jaime sitting behind her cannot chase away dreams colored in red and viscera. They only fade when she holds her lion cub. There is not a trace of Robert on him, nor on Myrcella and Tommen who come in due time._ In_ him is a different matter. Joffrey is a lion, born for red and gold, but even young he shows a ferocious temper. It reminds Cersei of her husband, but of course fools mistake it for an echo of the Mad King.

With little else to do, she gives him her hound. Whether it is fear or respect Cersei knows not, but the younger Clegane keeps him civil.

Robert still hates Joff though. Her golden boy is fierce and prone to temper, and her king refuses to think he had any influence. Entering Cersei's chambers one night, taking her with his usual force, then mumbling he wants the boy sent off to foster, is the first time she considers gouging his eyes out with a sewing needle.

In desperation she writes her father. Does he _want _his grandson tainted by Starks or Martells? His reply comes short and swift.

_Dictate a price. _

What does she have that is not already his? Cersei puzzles over this. By rights he can fuck her ten times a day…but is a lioness constrained by daft laws? If she were, she would have died that day in the courtyard, her brains congealing around her head. Instead, she seduced the Stranger.

She has not seen her jealous black prince since her wedding feast. Sometimes she feels a prickle, or sees a flash in the mirror, nothing more. Until she names her price.


	2. Restless Years

** A Dance with the Stranger**

**Chapter Two / Restless Years**

* * *

_… Ich gehör nur mir / I Belong to Me …_

* * *

The night comes when she sits at her vanity, a handmaiden brushing out her hair. Her doorhandle rattles and finally he pounds on the wood.

"Wife!" She can tell by his voice he is not so very drunk, but that only means he had several _cups_ of wine instead of decanters.

She grabs her handmaiden's wrist. "Open that door and I will cut your fingers off." The girl blanches and shuffles into another room.

"_Cersei_," he hoarsely moans, "I need my queen."

_What in seven hells did he drink?_ Collecting herself, the green-eyed lioness begins negotiations. She walks to the door, key tucked away in her dressing gown.

"Would a whore not suit you better? At dinner you called me cold and cruel."

Her husband was not expecting that. She braces for his torrent, and is surprised when he answers almost calmly.

"What in hell do you want?"

"What any mother wants," she replies, forcing her voice to be calm. As cold as he says she is. "Give me leave to raise my children or you would best move a brothel into your bedchamber."

Her heart hammers when he strikes the door. "I am your _king_."

"King of the Andals or King of Rape?"

That makes him pause. Her husband is a brute but does not like to be seen as such. When he cannot blame wine or pretend he did not hear, she has a chance of stopping him.

"Damn you, Cersei."

It stings to offer concessions…but a price often needs a pinch of sweetness. A lesson any girl learns well. "Husband, give me this and I will gladly welcome you into my bed." Even a lioness can purr when she must.

She thinks she has won when he shoves from the door and stalks off. He would never admit defeat to her. Most likely in a day or so he will rumble something about reconsidering his earlier choice, as he does with his advisers. Her breath rushes out in a long shudder. Between the pounding of her heart and the small tremor in her hands, Cersei is glad he could not see her. Had he been drunker or angrier he could have kicked down her door…she does not know if her king's recourse or her brother's reaction would be worse.

Exhausted, she collapses onto her large sleigh bed, shivering in her dressing gown. She hopes her children did not hear. Is this what being Queen is, an endless battle of domestic negotiations and veiled japes? She is the most powerful woman in the Seven Kingdoms and yet she feels powerless, forced to bargain herself to keep her children close. Always fighting upward, from a place of weakness. Her mother never…_Gods_, did the stupid maid leave a window open? Cersei jolts up, just as—

"—_Cersei_…" he soothes, appearing from the shadows.

The Stranger remains a wraith of Rhaegar, still dressed in black and glittering rubies, still difficult for her to focus on any specific part of him. So beautiful. Even Jaime cannot compare. The varnish long gone from her wedding day, she cannot help the way she aches.

Between her blink he now rests on the bed's carved footboard. She had candles burning but his world has once more bled into hers and all that gleams is moonlight on lacquered wood.

"My queen, what have they done to you?" His voice is mellifluent, steeped in all the whispered regard Robert refuses to show and Jaime is rarely allowed to.

At her half-intended nod he slips to her side, sitting on his knees. He gathers her into his lap. Still as soft as she remembers. And as sharp too, with his aquiline eyes, cold pride, and keen accord. And for the first time, his longing.

"Do you remember when we danced together?" His voice lowers and she feels the bottomless lake again. It can always draw her deeper. He caresses her cheek, lowers his face to hers like a paramour. "They are fools. Sink with me, be free. Fly with the one who loves you—"

His mouth is so near, noxious and beguiling. He has crawled to her, offering freedom, and she… she _trusted _the longing in his voice.

Her hand rams into his mouth, driving his perfect face away.

"How dare you!" Cersei shoves herself from her bier. Lunging to her feet, her legs burn and sting as blood races back. "You want me give in? _I do not!_"

His eyes go hard and his smile cuts like a saber. Like her, his pride has no place for looks of hurt.

"Get out!" _You almost abandoned Joffrey…you almost let Robert win_. "I am Cersei Lannister, and no man, no _spirit_ will best me."

Indifferent to her seething, he gives a cold nod and rises. "Foolish woman." She catches the barest flicker of pity, still too wrapped in ice to reach his voice. "The world is_ breaking_. You just don't realize it yet."

Cersei never loses her glare until he melts back into the shadows. Just who will do the breaking?

* * *

_… Die Schatten werden länger / The Shadows Grow Longer…_

* * *

Joffrey grins as the Gold Cloaks drag Eddard Stark away. Hardly an evening on the throne and he already looks born to it. Cersei lays her hand on his. Her son tolerates it a half-moment before twisting away. She smiles their secret smile, her lips curled the slightest to show her approval when saying so would be unsuitable.

He looks elsewhere, eyes darting, hunting through shadows. No one has removed the eviscerated corpses in front of the throne. Her cub seems almost…disappointed.

"What are you looking for, love?" she says softly.

"_Nothing._"

Cersei refrains from rolling her eyes. She loves him, but the boy is a poor liar. At least to her. _But who is he looking for? _A thought digs into her mind and won't let go. But she cannot very well ask him if he is visited by the Stranger who looks like Rhaegar Targaryen.

_Think of a problem and it appears._ Her father said that once, and like most things he is right. She feels the icy presence alight beside her, like a bird landing and fluttering its wings for balance. But when she looks askance, there is nothing there.

The Stranger appears in due time. Days later, the queen stands on the steps of the Great Sept of Baelor with her son, the Stark girl, and the Small Council. A crown suits him, as does looking over a crowd. When the roar begins, she knows they lead out Ned Stark. He limps, leaning more on his guard than his feet. His red-rimmed eyes shine with fever.

_An honorable man. A stupid man._

"A doomed man."

She startles at the discordant voice, earning a curious look from Lord Stark's pale daughter. No one else pays attention to the reflection of Rhaegar who appears beside her, his hair almost glowing in the sunlight. Cersei would yell at him, slap him, never forgive him for his almost-kiss…but any of those would have the Small Council thinking she has gone mad.

_An inglorious end but hardly doom. He finishes his days at the Wall, severed from his power._

His face tilts, eyes mocking. But as Lord Stark nears, she sees the Stranger's face grow blank. Melancholy. For a single moment, he is Rhaeger to her eyes. He turns to Joffrey, who smiles like it is his name day, then looks over to her, no softness, no cruelty either.

"You pull him into the night, my queen."

_Leave me!_

The Stranger does not. His attention falls only to Lord Stark. The man rasps out a confession, giving up everything he valued for everyone he loves. Raising a hand, the young king addresses his people. And suddenly the world explodes. Sansa screeches like a dying cat as someone restrains her. The eunuch is putting on a show. Ser Ilyn unsheathes his blade.

_This is madness._ Her little lion thinks like Robert; he does not see. _Jaime, they will kill Jaime._ Cersei crosses to him, whispers in his ear—

"Be _silent_, Mother." It comes out crooked, almost hesitant. But she does not doubt its weight.

When Robert first struck her, it shattered a dam. After that first backhand left her tasting blood, it took far less than the wolf bitch to make him lash out. Now that Joffrey has discarded her counsel—has ordered her complacency…

Her eyes narrow on the one person not flapping or shouting. Lord Baelish watches with impassive eyes as if the execution is no more than a dull stage show. Did his whispers sway her son? _Or someone else's?_

No one heeds the Stranger. He weaves through the pandemonium like a ghost. Ser Ilyn seems to move through chest-high water.

At last, her black prince kneels before the fallen lord. For once she sees him clear as day. He is a hunter, kneeling there in onyx leathers, his boots higher than his knees, red glinting from his chest. An ivory hand caresses Lord Stark's jaw. Tenderly, a last kindness for a doomed man. Cersei feels…_ah_, not a drop of compassion now, but a simmering anger that he receives the Stranger's pitying touch. _But you can choose when you take his kiss._

Eddard's eyes are no longer glazed in fever. He looks at his death and relaxes, almost peaceful. Cersei knows he sees someone else, a lover or a dream. The Stranger's lips press against his, a hand still holding his unshaved jaw. Her black prince freezes the life out of the northern lord.

Only a single blink and the steps shift. Cersei flinches at Ser Ilyn, almost where the Stranger stood, while Lord Stark's legs spasm in death as his neck gouts blood. There is no peace here.

An icy hand winds around hers as if he never moved at all. He squeezes, harder than is comfortable.

"Take heed, my cruel, hungry queen." His voice is sharp once more, on the cusp of dark amusement. "The shadows grow longer. Night comes before your day even begins."

In a flutter he is gone and Cersei remembers the others around her. Sansa has fallen in a dead faint—a guard knew not what to do with her.

"Clegane," she snaps. Her hound looks to attention. "Take the Stark girl to her chambers. Ensure a maid stays with her." Sansa does not seem the type to open her veins in a steaming bath or have the nerve to hang herself, but Cersei will take no chances._ Jaime, come back to me._

The Hound shoves his way to the white-lipped girl and scoops her up with ridiculous gentleness. Cersei laughs to herself, though most would think her jape cruel and in incredibly poor taste. Her mind thinks what it will.

Joff looks beatific as he studies the stray drops of blood on his knuckles, like it is a mystical work of art. It makes Cersei cringe. She never thought he would do something so _stupid_, not when his father is captive. And now, he looks like he would rather be sticking a sword in a girl instead of his cock. _Do not be a fool, he is reckless, not…dangerous_. Not to her.

Though the Stranger has left, she still feels a chill in her joints. She has a hundred things to do and only a few hours of daylight. Lord Stark's body has stilled, wallowing in blood. The chill does not leave; she cannot help but think of his words.

_Winter is coming._

_And the shadows grow longer._

* * *

_… Wenn ich Tanzen will / When I Want to Dance …_

* * *

Cersei stumbles onto her balcony, too warm by half and lusting for air. Wine and revelry do not mix well with a warm night. But to hell with that. The feast celebrates their victory over Stannis Baratheon. Her and her father's victory.

She is almost giggling, alive from head to foot, careening in glee. At last she has it. _Power._ Father respects her now—she saw the approval in his harsh face when she told him about the wildfire. Tyrion's actions caused more destruction than she intended, but it stalled Stannis's fleet long enough for her father to arrive. Now that her deformed brother has been knocked from his tower, her worst shackle is broken.

With Tywin as Hand, he can curtail Joffrey's more high strung antics. Joff and his affairs as the Hand will keep him busy. She remains Queen Regent, the most powerful woman in the Seven Kingdoms, and free to lead her family to further glory.

Jaime remains her one sorrow. Strung up in a Stark cell, to be poked and prodded like a caged beast…it makes her seethe. When he returns, she will seal her chamber from dusk to dawn. Robert's death will make moon tea a necessity, but that is a small price to pay.

Cersei sinks far enough into reverie that she realizes too late when her neck prickles with ice. A cool form envelops her, hands settling on hers. Her elbows shove him back. The Stranger or not, she is no doxy to use at will. As she twists to face him he takes her hand, fingers soft.

She no longer thinks of Rhaegar when she sees his pale face. His eyes are too old and sharp, his mouth too hard. Tonight he gives her his courtier's bow, and brings his wintry lips to her knuckles. Cersei has not seen him since Ned Stark's execution.

The sea below has gone quiet. Somehow he has encased them in his piecemeal world, like at her wedding feast. Instead of scowling, she smiles. Cersei can be a torment. This close, it is easy to hook her arms around his neck. She puts herself in danger, if he tries to steal her kiss and she is too slow to duck her head. But like that day in the courtyard, sometimes she welcomes danger. His mouth quirks in amusement.

"Calling on me in my moment of triumph?" she murmurs.

His canines flash. "_My_ triumph. War and death rage across the kingdoms, all to my vision."

"Death comes to us all, sweetling," she says, honeyed in her tone. "If it took a small war to see my son on the throne, so be it. The North is weak. Stannis is shattered, and my father will take care of the rest."

He laughs into her shoulder. Cersei never relaxes completely around him, ever since he almost seduced her. The Stranger regards her with coy eyes that have seen too much.

"Your bloodthirst blinds you. Let me accompany you through the storm."

She leans forward and bites his throat. As she thought, she tastes nothing, senses no blood, and he hardly looks bothered. But no one is too high above her to act like her guiding light. Not even a god.

"I need no one's company. I cut my strings."

The Stranger slips one arm around her waist, as if they are dancing once again. When Cersei blinks, she can feel a shift. She still stands upon her balcony, but also in a great hall, its walls aphotic and the other guests shadowed. _What nerve! _The Stranger pulls her into that same strange dance from her wedding, that flowing, twisting thing she has only seen here in these wraithlike halls. Against her better judgment she falls into the steps, chooses to take this dance. So many men clamor for her at feast—it amuses her to give her hand first to death. But she must be wary of that ache.

"You are only free through me," he says, spinning her.

She smiles, fierce. "Why would I want any freedom with _you _attached?"

"Because I am the only one who understands you, and you love me."

_As if._ "My brother—"

"Does not understand himself. How can he understand you? You dance to a music few hear—that few_ want_ to hear." He speaks so pleasantly as he pulls her closer, lips murmuring at her temple. _I should never trust this cold creature when he sounds this dulcet… _"No one else savors your venom, admires your cruelty and your pride. Your beauty and brittleness—"

Cersei whirls away from him, teeth bared, breaking out of his grasp. "I am _not _brittle."

Though bearing no judgment, he grows less amused. "You were only strong when you believed you were weak. You will call on me, lioness."

"Get used to loneliness," she snaps. "My life is good again."

She sees the cruel lines near his mouth deepen. "Soon you will hate it. The power you crave will become another collar, tightening until you fight the leash instead of its keeper."

The Stranger reaches for her and she slaps at his cheek. For once, he catches her hand. Cersei feels an embarrassing stab of fear—the last time a man did that, he dislocated her wrist. But the Stranger merely lowers it, grip loose.

"Peace, my queen. You gave me a dance. I will give you a gift."

"What kind of gift? A gift of Death?" She is suspicious. His coy eyes hold too many centuries and secrets. _My queen_—she does not miss the small mockery. He accords her the title only because death reigns over all.

"Your child's life."

It stops her cold. She spins on her heel again, tearing free and demanding herself to return to the balcony. Once more, Cersei looks out over the battlements and bay. Alone.

* * *

_…_ _Alle Fragen sind gestellt / All Questions are Answered …_

* * *

A Lannister wedding is a glorious affair. A Tyrell wedding is a radiant one. When the houses join in marriage, the spectacle sets the city ablaze in crimson and roses. _I would rather set the city ablaze with wildfire_, she thinks with surly peevishness. She draws long on her cup of wine, barely tasting its floral and oaken notes.

Cersei loathes that the Stranger was right. Since her father forced her to remarry, every day carries her closer to another painful marriage bed, another brute, and another hand on her leash. _As if. _She is no girl. Her husband will learn that quickly enough.

At least her son looks resplendent. His red and black raiment will be worn once, and costs more than some peasants earn in a dozen years. She supposes his bride looks attractive too, with eyes as big a doe's, and a face made for summer. It is nearly impossible to be unattractive at six-and-ten, unless one is as horrid looking as Stannis's daughter

Lady Sansa, she admits, is a striking beauty, stupid though she is. According to her spies, the Imp will not bed her until she wants it. He will not hold out until she is willing though, for Cersei can imagine venereal diseases more pleasant than her brother, but she supposes she approves of the sentiment. At least it gives her the chance to mock his impotency, and keeps him even further from her father's favor.

Joffrey has just cut a pie filled with pigeons and Cersei looks away as one flaps too close to her cheeks. Then she takes notice, almost dropping her cup. The Stranger leans against a nearby wall, eyes hooded. He dresses as a courtier. The black velvet and rubies do not seem to shift to leather with every change in light. Her son takes a generous gulp of wine, not the first of such. He has ordered his uncle to be his cupbearer.

Excusing herself, she stalks up to her black prince, leaning against the space next to him.

_What are you doing here? I hardly lack for dancing partners._

"Do you think yourself so important?" His voice sounds clipped, as if she is distracting him.

Her stomach goes cold. When she looks over, his eyes are blank. Not avoiding hers, but divorced from all expression. _Who dies?_

The cough answers for her. Cersei snaps toward the sound—toward her cub. Pounding his chest, the young king clears his throat, red in embarrassment. _Or red with…_

_Poison._

Cersei bolts. If she can reach him, ram her fingers down his throat! He keeps hacking, sounds growing wheezier. Already his Kingsguard are tearing his beautiful collar. Then she hits a wave of water. Or rather, something slows her, fights her every step and slows every moment. So is everyone. The Tyrell crone screeches for aid. Tywin is halfway to him, ready to haul him up by his leg and beat it out of him if necessary. Margaery has backed away, a hand to her mouth, while her younger brother stands beside her, hand on his pommel.

Nothing slows death. The Stranger glides to the boy, who dangles from his Kingsguard's grasp. Her young king twitches like an animal near-death from an arrow. Yet Joffrey's head tilts up and his choking quiets, suspended in the same limbo as the one that cripples her.

Joff does not draw back or look surprised. But he does look straight at him, and Cersei can see recognition. In tangle of memory, she thinks the steps of Baelor. A lion, even a cruel one, does not know his own strength until he is _told_. Who made him think he could execute the Warden of the North without consequence?

The Stranger's lips brush the boy's, no last stroke of gentleness. Her son simply falls. When the room blinks into focus, Cersei is already screaming. Collapsing to his side, she almost wretches when she sees his clawed throat.

"_You promised!You promised!You promised!_" Few could likely make out what she said between snot-soaked sobs._ He lied to me._

When she looks up, she sees the dwarf who promised to destroy what she loved, who _served his wine_. She demands his arrest, before crumpling back with her babe.

A hand settles on her shoulder. At first she wrenches away, expecting to see white hair and violet eyes. It is her father.

"Let him go, Cersei."

As if she would ever…but two Kingsguard pull her away. Hooking an arm under hers, Tywin half-leads, half-drags her from the feast hall, Cersei sobbing the entire time. He kicks open a door and hauls her into the corridor. For the briefest moment he embraces her, cheek grazing her hair. But an instant later he remembers himself, and keeps her at arm's length.

"_Where is Tommen?_" she squalls.

"With the Kingsguard. Retire to your chambers, daughter. There is nothing you can do now."

He steps away and has to grab her as she buckles, her vision mottled and her head reeling. Muttering a curse, he picks her up like she has already fainted, and calls for his own guards.

"Take her to her chambers. Stay by the door."

Tywin hands her off and Cersei's cheek pinches against armor. It is not soft, not one bit. Her snot-and-tear-stained face must look wretched. As if she cares. She hangs limp as a trampled flower when her guard lowers her to the bed and leaves.

She thinks her world cannot fall further. She is wrong.


	3. The Stars' Descent

**A Dance with the Stranger**

**Chapter Three / The Stars' Descent**

* * *

_… Wo bist du? / Where are you?_…

* * *

In a month, her father's legacy is burnt and shattered like a lightening-struck tree. The Old Lion is dead, her son is dead, one brother is crippled, and the other has escaped and plots her death. _At least I will not wed. The Red Viper is dead, Balon Greyjoy is dead, Theon Greyjoy is as good as dead, the Tyrell crone refused to offer her heir, and the remaining Warden married a Frey sow._

_Tommen. Everything lies with Tommen, though he is more kitten than cub._

Her own safety is far from guaranteed. Jaime commands the Kingsguard, but when Cersei told him she would only feel safe with him in her bed, he _refused_ her.

Most days she can stitch together the wan smile of a strong, mourning mother, but not tonight. Too much wine, too much death, has left her sprawled on her feather-stuffed bed, arms spread wide. Cersei wants her black prince, his tender-cruel eyes, his cold pride. She wants his kiss, craves it more than any passion. She hardly cares if he baited Joff, if he fostered this war into existence.

"Have I not endured enough?" She may keen to shadows but she cares not. He will hear. With all the death in King's Landing, he cannot be far. "You were _right_," her voice chokes deep in her throat. "Always right, my merciful prince. Come to me, let us fly away."

Her eyes are closed when he hand touches her cheek. She sobs in relief, can almost feel his chilling breath, and looks. He stands at her bedside, not leaning over her like she thought. Then his fingers slide to her throat, hard as ice. His expression makes her freeze.

Cersei always thought of fury as hot and wild. A winter storm is deadly, but not angry. The Stranger _is_. His lips curl in a disdainful smile, but his violet eyes are narrowed and steely. At a certain point, ice and fire burn just the same.

"No." His wintry breath is sharp and brittle. "You mean nothing to me."

His pride is the same as hers. Cersei will not be spurned; she will deny she ever wanted it in the first place. And she knows his hand was first gentle on her face. She almost made him reconsider, and that has sharpened his fury.

"So death denies me?" Her teeth bare in a smile. "Now I can ride to Stannis and take his head off."

He laughs, as cold and dark as that world he has sometimes let her glimpse. "No, you would not." Too bound to her, he knows her next thought. "Just_ try_ hanging yourself, my queen. I will leave you like that, with your neck black as your son's, blood seeping from your eyes, completely and painfully alive."

Cersei was already a wounded lioness when she entered her chamber. To her shame, it takes little to break her claws. "Why did you lie to me?" Her voice is small.

_As if death would lie_, his scowl says. He may not be human, but even a beast has pride. And she will always find another way to lance it. His shifting form seems to fade, to slide back into the darkness. But she hears his voice one last time.

"_How many children do you have?_"

It takes longer than it should for her to make sense of it. _Why did you save the wrong one?_

Yet she cannot help her sobs of relief months later when she receives word from Dorne. Her beautiful Myrcella was attacked by a traitor and saved by her shying horse. He wanted her head but got her ear. Either he is the most incompetent traitor to grace the Seven Kingdoms, or her daughter's horse saw Death that day.

* * *

_ …_ _Am Deck der sinkenden Welt / On the Deck of a Sinking World ..._

* * *

When the mummer's dragon arrives, he will find the fire his ancestors thought was theirs alone. She hopes it cooks him alive in his armor. Her attendants say she should fear his kinswoman, but Cersei thinks not. When the dragon mother landed near the Neck, she went north to the Wall. What kind of dragon flies into the cold? _A dead one._ Others take the usurping bitch. Cersei rallies her defenses against Rhaegar's son…_almost my son_. She hates that thought.

Sometimes she wants to treat with him. She is still beautiful, still fertile. It makes her think of her former Master of Coin. Cersei had laughed and refused when Lord Baelish asked to wed Sansa Stark, but only because he was scarcely higher than a peasant. She would permit many ills toward the girl, even wedding the wretch who saw only his dead woman, but Cersei would not condemn her to a commoner's wedding. If she were to meet Rhaegar's son, charm him, ensnare him, it would be such sweet irony. Alas, she doubts he will parley, and so he must die. She will not be as crude as a warhammer though.

For now, she must keep justice in King's Landing.

A mummer's show has picked up a following. _The Lion's Fall_, a backbiting history of the Lannisters. The company performs in a tavern. Her attendants do not know she sneaks out of her den sometimes, to wander as only a bold lioness can. Hooded and cloaked, she sidles into a free space along the tavern wall, nose curling at the smell of drink. Her guard captain stands beside her, his gold cloak left behind. Outside, his men wait for her signal.

Already the tavern is sweltering from the number of dirty bodies. Most eyes fix on the platform before the hearth.

The amber-eyed, dark-haired man calls himself the Dornishman. Cersei thinks him a thinly veiled mock of the Red Viper. As he narrates the history of the Lannisters, other actors mime his words. Then he nears the present. Sweeping his arm to the crowd, winking at a wench who sprawls in a brute's lap, he addresses them like a grotesquerie host.

"King's Landing is a ship, and the ship goes down, its hull clawed open. How did we arrive at such a place? May I present—_Gerion Lannister!_ " A man in a long blond wig steps out, hand to his brow as if searching the horizon. Cersei thinks he looks nothing like Uncle Gerion. The Dornishman mocks a tone of bravado, his teeth stark white against his olive skin. "A fearless adventurer. He would find his family's ancestral sword, and set sail for the Smoking Sea. Sinking, sank, _sunk_!" The blond man suddenly crashes to his knees, pretending to choke and drown.

A burly man appears, waving a sword, only to spasm and die as the dark-haired actor japes about her uncle Tygett. Kevan dies from an argument with the now-late Maester Pycelle. When an actor takes the stage with glued-on golden whiskers, Cersei's nails dig into her flesh. The tavern is already laughing. They _roar_ when her father appears.

"_Tywin Lannister!_ How we love him for his vigorous sacking. You know what they say about Lannisters and gold?" He winks, and her father's counterpart mimes sitting on a privy, his face screwed in frustration. "Shot while taking a shit…he must've died aggrieved, knowing we would learn the truth about the lion's gold."

Cersei feels her blood simmer, then _boil_ as a young, sweet-faced youth steps up, wearing an oversized crown and accompanied by a doe-eyed girl who could only be the Tyrell whore. The girl frantically waves for help, looking repulsed when the boy takes her hand.

"_Joffrey Lanni—ah, my pardons, Baratheon!_ I guess you can tie antlers to an alley cat and call it a stag. Our sweet king left us too young, poisoned at his own wedding. My king, is that a_ thorn_ in your throat?" The youth dies clawing at his neck and the girl takes a deep bow. The tavern eruptsin wild cheers and whistles.

She is about to signal her guards, about to claw the Dornishman's face off, until she hears—

"_Cersei Lannister!_ Would that she loves her city as much as she loves her brother…or the Kingsguard." A fat-breasted woman staggers out with a goblet of wine, waving her free hand as if giving orders. Several curs shout vulgarities. The Dornishman wags his finger. "If you sinners doubt the gods, shame on you! How deep does the Stranger's love go? He rescued the Red Viper and the Old Kraken before they could take her hand in marriage. A pity King Robert was not so loved." The woman's orders become erratic, and she bashes her goblet into an adviser. "At least with dragons, everyone expects them to go mad!"

Cheeks flushed in fury, she hisses at her captain. Her guards are not kind, but still more merciful than she. In the end, the Gold Cloaks drag the actors to the Red Keep, break the tavern owner's arms, and beat any man who has not fled into the night.

Cersei grins when the Dornishman collapses at her feet, his pretty white teeth splashed pink from a split lip. She sits on the Iron Throne now. It feels like she was born for it. For his japes he loses his hands, for his lies he loses his tongue. Thank goodness Tommen is asleep…she tries to show him the ferocity needed to be a king, but the boy learns slowly.

They say she is mad. _All men say such when a woman takes what she wants._ No one challenges her though. Not when the behemoth knight stands near the throne, rock-still except when he kills. Ser Robert Strong is perhaps the most useful man she has ever known. No bargains, no prices, no questions, just orders and blood.

But power weighs on her. Every day, without fail, she is told how close the Targaryen is, and how inadequate her defenses are. And the _whispers_. She used to have someone who could tell her what they meant and if they were true. Until she realized, while breaking her fast and listening to his report of the North, that the eunuch was a liar and traitor who hid in plain sight. She knows he will learn of any plot, so she does not plot. She calls in Ser Robert from outside her door and steps back to avoid the blood. Qyburn warned her that the Spider kept agents in the walls, and so her Gold Cloaks spent a month purging the Red Keep. Ser Robert guards her while she sleeps in case she missed one.

Sometimes she regrets not keeping Varys alive. Like the day her guard captain tells her the city is being attacked from within.

* * *

_…Der Schleier fällt / The Veil Falls …_

* * *

Treachery. She felt that first cold stab when the Stranger abandoned her. Soon after she realized that he had always been near—as a presence she could not describe, but feels with a keening loss now. A flash in the mirror, a flutter of dark wings, or an overlong shadow. Perhaps that is why Robert met a boar that day instead of a deer. Why Jon Arryn keeled over from poison _just _before he revealed her secret.

She feels a second stab when her city turns into a bloodbath. No warships sail through the bay, no army crests the hills—_fuck_, no _dragon_screeches in the sky. And yet her gold cloaks are falling back, caught by surprise and overpowered. The fighting erupted just outside of the Red Keep when nameless faces in the crowd drew steel and massacred the nearby guards.

The lioness sits on her throne, glaring at Qyburn who tells her they are led by Ser Bronn of the Blackwater. Cersei's knuckles ache from how hard she grips her throne. The low-born scum…she had forgotten about him after her trial, for what cause would he have to attack the capital? Her breath shudders as the question comes to her. Once a sellsword, _always_ a sellsword.

"Who paid this dog?"

_The Targaryen, more cunning than he seems? Dorne, aiding their mummer's dragon?_ _My hellspawn brother, the dragon queen's rumored jester?_Qyburn hesitates, sweat already gathered at his gray-shot temples. This makes her eyes narrow—the reason she likes the former maester is his calm but honest manner.

"It is not clear. But…" he breathes deep and does not meet her eyes. "Ser Jaime is with them."

Blood drains from her lips. Jaime turned on her too, but with an ugly, _freakish_ slut from Tarth. He disappeared while she shamed herself before the whole of King's Landing. Her false twin, her children's treacherous father. _My _little_ brother. Not my littlest._

_Why? Is it not enough to abandon me? _She cannot wreak vengeance on the Stranger, but Jaime is only mortal. Her fingers tremble, half in excitement, half nerves.

"Find a choke point and send Ser Robert to hold them. Drive the scum together and release the wildfire."

He hesitates. "Your Grace, releasing wildfire in the city…"

"—Will save it from worse if the sellswords gain a foothold. The area outside the Red Keep is mostly stone."

"…Yes, your Grace."

_I am the last of a legacy with little hope left._ Without her, Tommen and Myrcella will die or fall into disgrace. _Who is this fool to question me?_ Normally she would tell Ser Strong to run him through if he did not follow her orders, but she would be mad to turn him against his creator.

"Ser Robert, go with him. Fight hard and keep him safe."

The hulking knight clanks to life and follows the shuffling man from the throne room. She is alone, having done away with personal guards since Ser Strong. If an army breached the throne room, two regular guards were not going to save her. Her son is safe in his rooms, guarded by a dozen men. _What is Jaime doing? They say _I_ have gone mad. _Killing Tommen though…no, he would never. _Taking _Tommen…_why?_

The throne's metal is cold so she folds her hands in her lap. Lannister red tends toward crimson, but oxblood and carmine look the best against the iron. Her dress is the color of dark blood, the material heavy to ward off the increasingly cold weather.

She could run. Run to Tommen, or barricade herself within her chambers, or try to flee the city. But that would leave the throne empty. A lioness may escape, but she does not hide. _And I am tired._ Sleep takes her in ephemeral bursts, and only after wine. _Nerves_, Qyburn says. Whatever it is, her eyes feel dry and a headache hangs just beyond outright pain.

Jaime enters alone. He wears a breastplate and pauldrons, but nothing like his magnificent gold or Kingsguard armor. His sword is bright with blood. _Brother? Lover? Father to my children?_

She straightens her already straight back and returns her hands to the throne's arms. _Cold…_in a blink she feels it, an imperceptible _shift_. A flutter of wings in the back of her mind, shadows flickering in the corners, heedless of the burning sconces. Imagining these things would be utterly mad. Jaime watches her, expression guarded. She sees that he favors one leg.

Though she wants to rage at him, she forces her voice to calm. "Where is Ser Robert?"

His eyes darken. "In four corners of King's Landing. What pit of hell did you drag that thing from? The madman was too dead to say."

"And now Tommen and I die too." She laughs, for she will never cry.

Jaime stays silent a moment, likely to keep from shouting. He starts across the throne room, slowed by his injured leg. "No, but I knew you wouldn't leave unless I dragged you out of here. I don't know if you are mad or suicidal, but I am taking you and Tommen. Let the dragons have it—they will kill every Lannister, down to the lowest bastard."

"You would abandon our throne? Our Rock?" _Why can he not see?_

He allows the smallest, bitterest of smiles. "It's not our Rock anymore, though we still drip Lannister gold. You know it was never our throne."

Gods, that mercenary lord—Cersei balks, refusing to comprehend, but the truth remains. And it drives her to her feet, snarling and cursing. "You sold our legacy to a _fucking sellsword_?"

"He already has a Tyrion."

Almost in a daze, she descends from the dais. He is several yards from the steps when they meet.

"I do not give in to men or dragons or traitors." Her voice sounds shrill to her ears, sharp and brittle. "I am _never_ leaving here."

Cersei slaps him, a nail cutting his cheek. He pushes her back with the pommel of his sword. Off-balance, she stumbles into his crooked arm, his golden fingers prodding her back. He has not lowered his sword hand. The blade rests along her collar bones. _Of all the strange places for a sword…_When she looks up, his eyes are glassy, transfixed. Cersei realizes now what he came here to do has just parted ways from what he _will _do.

"I know," he croaks. He drags the sword across her throat.

Somewhere, she knows she gurgles and falls against him. The sword clatters between them. She knows he is crying, and that her blood is drenching his chest as he pulls her close. He did not ride here to kill her. They sink, Cersei to her side, her twin to his knees. Sinking, but not as far as she wants.

Her throne room darkens, and a bleeding throat seems like a trifling thing. She climbs to her feet. Jaime remains but she can barely hear him, can barely see him, and knows he does not see her. Her hand runs through his hair once more, as filthy as it is. He came for Tommen—their son will be safe. Cersei cares more for that than Jaime opening her throat.

"Still you make me wait, Cersei?" His voice settles around her like a warm day in winter. Her twin will never know why his mind changed so fast. Cersei will.

She knows those fluttering wings at the edges of her sight, knows those writhing shadows—he can no more abandon her than she can despise him. The Stranger stands at the bottom of the dais, the sun from the window above the throne catching his face in a dappled light.

"Can I be free of this mad place?"

He smiles, teeth whiter than his pale hair. It will never be a smile entirely of affection, but her love will never be without cruelty. Their pride has the same cracks.

"Let the dragons burn it. We will sink, or fly, or lose ourselves in eternity if you wish it."

Cersei stops just out of reach. With the diffidence of her maidenhood and the cool assurance of her regency, she extends a hand. The queen would make him wait until the world ended. The Stranger knows this. Even if it destroyed her, Cersei would always be the one to choose. He takes her hand and brushes it with his lips.

All questions asked, she throws herself into his arms .

"The world wanted to cage me," she murmurs, nuzzling against him. "I showed them they could not."

The Stranger's laugh rumbles in his chest. "The world will think you a mad fool." As if she cares what _they _think. "They will think you wicked for not sheathing your claws, purging your venom, or crushing your hate."

_All the things you love me for. _She has stayed loyal to herself. Was it better, wiser, or nobler to scratch out the eyes that judged, cut the strings that pulled, and take her pleasure when it suited? Let others look in vain. Will he still love her the moment she is no longer the living creature who spurned and danced with him? She does not know, but perhaps it does not matter.

Cersei looks up at the Stranger. This time, neither can find the desire for cruelty. It is a first and final kiss that always allured her, enraged her, or repelled her, but never frightened her. The end of a dance to which, if she hated the music, she chose her own steps. His kiss is warmer than she thought, as she sinks against his arms, her eyes fluttering as her heart drums to a stop.

* * *

The Stranger kisses her once more. Cersei is almost as cold as he is.

Her twin struggles to his feet, her corpse in his bloodstained arms. With something close to reverence he sets her on the Iron Throne. She looks peaceful, apart from the red cut across her throat. His arm is too bloody—Jaime cannot wipe away his tears, tears he never expected after she sauntered so far into madness. But now he must find his son, and make for the Free Cities.

Jaime always knew she had a shadow at her back, a darkness she could never flee or escape. It was not until he entered the throne room and saw her jaded eyes, heard her empty laugh, that he knew she never wanted to escape at all.


End file.
